Keynote Speakers
June 23, 2026 (Tuesday)
10:00 am, June 23 (Tuesday) – Conference Chair Remarks
10:10 am, June 23 (Tuesday) – Conference Opening and Host Welcome
10:30 am, June 23 (Tuesday) – Keynote
11:00 am, June 23 (Tuesday) – Industry Keynote
11:30 am, June 23 (Tuesday) – Keynote
Pelin Pekgün, Ph.D.
Department Chair for Analytics, Information Systems, Marketing & Operations Management (AIMO)
Thomas H. Davis Professor in Business and Professor of Analytics
School of Business
Wake Forest University
Winston-Salem, NC, USA
Presentation Title: Reducing Food Waste While Fighting Hunger: The Role of Distribution Strategies in Food Bank Operations
Pelin Pekgün is Thomas H. Davis Professor in Business and Professor of Analytics at Wake Forest University School of Business. She also serves as the Department Chair of Analytics, Information Systems, Marketing & Operations Management. She was formerly a Dean’s Fellow and associate professor of management science in the Darla Moore School of Business at the University of South Carolina. She also established and served as the Faculty Director of the Master of Science in Business Analytics program at the Darla Moore School of Business. Her research interests include applications of management science and operations research in supply chain management, pricing and revenue management, marketing/operations interface, and humanitarian and non-profit operations. Her research has appeared in top journals including Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, Production and Operations Management, Journal of Operations Management, Journal of Marketing, Decision Sciences and IIE Transactions.
Prior to joining academia, Professor Pekgün led the operations research team in North America at JDA Software’s Pricing and Revenue Management Group, where she worked in various projects in retail, hospitality, passenger travel and other leisure industries. Her work with the Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group on stay night price optimization was a finalist for the 2012 INFORMS Franz Edelman Award and the 2013 INFORMS Revenue Management and Pricing Section Practice Award. She currently serves as an Associate Editor for Manufacturing & Service Operations Management and Decision Sciences journals, and the Editor of the annual special issue dedicated to the Edelman Award finalist papers for the INFORMS Journal on Applied Analytics. She also serves as the Secretary on the INFORMS Board of Directors and Executive Committee and as the Vice President, Industry on the Production and Operations Management Society (POMS) Board.
Professor Pekgün holds M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in industrial and systems engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology, and B.S. and M.S. degrees in industrial engineering from Bogazici University in Istanbul, Turkey.
12:00 pm, June 23 (Tuesday) – Keynote
June 24, 2026 (Wednesday)
10:00 am, June 24 (Wednesday) – Keynote
Dr. Sila Çetinkaya, Ph.D.
Professor of Operations Research and Engineering Management
Cecil H. Green Professor of Engineering
Lyle School of Engineering
Southern Methodist University
Dallas, Texas, USA
Sila Çetinkaya is Professor of OREM and Cecil H. Green Professor of Engineering in the SMU Lyle School of Engineering. She holds courtesy appointments with ITOM in the SMU Cox School of Business and with Internal Medicine in the UT Southwestern Medical Center.
Çetinkaya’s research interests include supply chain and healthcare analytics, stochastic optimal control theory, and applied probability. Her publications appeared in the most reputable outlets of industrial engineering and management science including Operations Research, Management Science, Production and Operations Management, Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE) Transactions, INFORMS Journal of Applied Analytics (previously, Interfaces), Naval Research Logistics, and Transportation Research-B and -E, among many others. Her research program has been funded by multiple grants from National Science Foundation (NSF), Department of Education, Texas Engineering Education Coordination Board, Frito-Lay, Pepsi-Co, and Nokia, among other sponsors. She serves as a department editor of IISE Transactions and an associate editor of Naval Research Logistics. Çetinkaya is a member of INFORMS and IISE.
Education
- Ph.D., Management Science, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada
- M.Sc., Industrial Engineering, Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey
- B.Sc., Industrial Engineering, Istanbul Technical University, Istanbul, Turkey
10:30 am, June 24 (Wednesday) – Industry Keynote
11:00 am, June 24 (Wednesday) – Industry Keynote
11:30 am, June 24 (Wednesday) – Keynote
Prof. Dr. Semail ÜLGEN
Chair of Industrial Engineering Department
Antalya Bilim University
Antalya, Turkey
Assoc. Prof. Semail Ülgen is the chair of Industrial Engineering Department at Antalya Bilim University where she has been on the faculty since 2012. She received Ph.D. degree in Mathematics at Purdue University in 2005, and B.S. degree at Bilkent University in 1995. In years 2004-2006 she was at University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS as an assistant professor. Then she worked at Grand Valley State University, Allendale, MI, as an assistant professor for one year in 2006 and later she worked as an assistant professor at Northwestern University for three years starting in 2007. She held visiting assistant professor position at Indiana University, Bloomington, IN as an assistant professor for one year in 2011-1012. Dr. Ülgen was a recipient of the Young Scientist Award for Turkish American Scientists and Scholars Association (USA) in 2006. Her research interests are Finsler Geometry; Noncommutative Geometry, Applications to Mathematical Physics. She is also building research interest in stochastic processes and its applications. She was a researcher in TUBITAK 1001 (the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey) research project (#113F311, Title: Einstein metrics in Finsler Geometry) for two years in 2014. She served as the adviser for the Survey Development and Implementation ATSO Pilot Project for Determining the Industrial 4.0 Status of Companies in Antalya in 2017. She was the academic adviser of the TUBITAK Efficiency Challenge Electric Vehicle Competition for mainly engineering undergraduate students during the years 2016, 2017, and 2020 organized by TUBITAK. Her team built two electric cars (got 25th in the competitions) and attended the competitions.
12:00 pm, June 24 (Wednesday) – Keynote
June 25, 2026 (Thursday)
10:00 am, June 25 (Thursday) – Keynote
Sinan Onal, Ph.D.
Professor and Chair of Industrial Engineering
Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville (SIUE)
Edwardsville, Illinois, USA
Sinan Onal, Ph.D., is a Professor and Chair in the Department of Industrial Engineering at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE). His work focuses on how AI and machine learning can be designed and deployed as part of real operational systems, with an emphasis on reliability, accountability, and measurable outcomes. His research interests include human-centered AI in healthcare operations and data-driven decision support for early identification and follow-up pathways. A key application area in his group is gait-based analysis (iGAIT) as a scalable signal to support earlier screening and referral workflows, especially when stakeholders extend beyond the clinic to include families, schools, payers, and public agencies. He also works on AI-enabled quality and inspection systems, applying computer vision and statistical learning to improve process performance and product quality in industrial settings.
Dr. Onal has been active in the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE), serving as President of the Data Analytics & Information Systems (DAIS) Division, as a Board Director, and as Chairperson for DAIS-related activities at the IISE Annual Conference. His recognitions include the SIUE Teaching Excellence Award, the SIU System Collaboration Award, the SIU Faculty Collaborations Award, the Hoppe Research Professor Award, Outstanding IE Teaching Awards, the IISE Energy Systems Division Best Paper Award, an invited speaker role for the Service-Learning Workshop at Arizona State University, and selection for the Frontiers of Engineering Education Symposium at the National Academies’ Beckman Center.
Presentation Title: Engineering Faculty as System Designers in the AI Era: Designing Incentives, Verification, and Evidence of Learning
Abstract: Generative AI has changed the operating conditions of engineering education. When high-quality text, code, and reports can be produced quickly, the final deliverable becomes a weaker signal of student understanding. This keynote reframes the role of engineering faculty from “tool adopters” to system designers who shape the socio-technical environment in which learning occurs through policy, incentives, assessment structures, workflows, feedback loops, and integrity mechanisms.
The keynote speaker will present three design principles: (1) incentives drive behavior, meaning grading and task design shape how AI is used; (2) learning evidence must be separated from deliverable polish, requiring assessment of reasoning and decision-making; and (3) verification must be built into the workflow so quality and integrity emerge from design rather than policing. Practical “next semester” moves will be shared, including AI-use disclosure standards, data-boundary rules, short oral micro-defenses, checkpoint-based grading, and required verification elements such as baselines, sensitivity analysis, and limitations.
A simple measurement dashboard will be introduced to track learning gains, verification quality, communication under scrutiny, responsible AI use, teamwork behaviors, and reduced project rework. Attendees will leave with a practical framework for redesigning courses and program assessment to protect rigor while increasing industry relevance in an AI-enabled world.
10:30 am, June 25 (Thursday) – Keynote
Prof. Fitra Lestari, ST, MEng, PhD, IPM, ASEAN Eng
Professor, Industrial Engineering Department
Faculty Science and Technology
UIN Sultan Syarif Kasim Riau, Indonesia
Fitra Lestari is currently a Professor and Former Head of Industrial Engineering Department in Faculty Science and Technology, UIN Sultan Syarif Kasim Riau, Indonesia. Then, He also Head of Halal Research Group (INPROMAS), UIN Sultan Syarif Kasim Riau, Indonesia. He gained his BEng and MEng in Industrial Engineering from Andalas University (Indonesia) and Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM- Malaysia). Then, He has continued the PhD project at UTM Malaysia in the field of Supply chain relationships in a downstream sector of the Palm Oil industry. He has published extensively including several refereed journal papers, conference papers, book chapters, and edited reference books associated with Supply Chain Management, Marketing, Logistic, and Performance Measurement. He serves as a reviewer, associate editor and editorial member for several national and international journals. He joins as a member of the International Association of Engineers (IAENG), and Director of student competition in Industrial Engineering and Operations Management (IEOM Society- Indonesia), and General Secretary of Indonesian Industrial Engineering Higher Education Organizing Agency (BKSTI Indonesia-Sumatera II). He also registered as Halal Auditor in Indonesia. His industrial and government collaborators include Strategy of Small Medium Enterprises, Halal Supply Chain dan Performance Assessment and Institutional Strengthening of Oil Palm Supply Chains.
Presentation Title:
Abstract:
11:00 am, June 25 (Thursday) – Keynote
Prof Ataur Rahman, PhD
Professor of Water and Environmental Engineering
School of Engineering, Design and Built Environment
Western Sydney University, Sydney, Australia
Associate Editor, Journal of Hydrologic Engineering (ASCE) (USA), Water (Switzerland) and Australasian Journal of Water Resources
Title: Effective doctoral supervision in engineering in the era of AI
Professor Ataur Rahman is a renowned authority in water, environment, and climate change related research. He is a Professor in water engineering at Western Sydney University, Australia. He completed his PhD in Water Engineering at Monash University in 1997. His research focuses on flood modelling, rainwater harvesting, climate change, water quality assessment, engineering education and water-sensitive urban design. He has served as a visiting academic at Cornell University, Vienna University of Technology, University of New South Wales, Masdar Institute and INRS Canada. A co-author of the Australian Rainfall and Runoff guidelines and co-developer of the ARR-RFFE tool, he has authored 611 publications including 193 ISI listed journal articles. Listed among the world’s top 2% scientists, he is a Fellow of Engineers Australia and an award-winning PhD supervisor. His work is widely cited, with over 11,500 citations and an h-index of 52 and i10-index of 186 in Google Scholar. Professor Rahman has also provided expert consulting to many organizations such as the Government of Qatar, Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Gold Coast City Council, Sydney Water, GHD, and Blacktown City Council.
11:30 am, June 25 (Thursday) – Industry Keynote
12:00 pm, June 25 (Thursday) – Industry Keynote